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June 15, 2026
ANDREW CLENNELL: A short time ago, I asked the opposition Defence spokesman, Liberal Senator James Paterson, about this, but first I asked him for his views on the peace deal reached between the US and Iran.
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: It's certainly welcome, but there have been a few false starts in these negotiation so far, so we're only cautiously welcoming it at this stage. We hope it's successful, we hope it holds, but it will be important to understand what the terms of the deal are. It's critically important from Australia's point of view that there are no tolls on the Strait of Hormuz, that free trade is resumed through that critical waterway, and that Iran abandons its nuclear weapons ambitions, which are so threatening to regional and global stability.
CLENNELL: Well, that's a big if on the nuclear, isn't it? I mean, do you have any confidence that we'll be any further along than at the start of the war in terms of the nuclear program when this settlement is reached?
PATERSON: I think something has changed with Iran's nuclear weapons program, which is firstly, it's been significantly physically impacted by US and Israeli operations in the two strikes in the two periods of conflict over the last two years. But secondly, the American resolve to dismantle Iran's nuclear weapons program has become more clear than ever before. They are in no doubt that we have a President in the White House who has been willing to order military strikes on Iran more than once in order to achieve this objective. No previous President has been willing to do that. So the negotiations are being conducted in that context and also in a context where the United States has prevented passage of Iranian oil through the Strait of Hormuz effectively for a long period of time, crippling the Iranian domestic economy and could do so again at any point. So I think the United State has leverage now that it has not previously had in negotiations, and I'm hopeful that that means Iran has agreed to more favourable terms.
CLENNELL: Was the war worth it then in your view?
PATERSON: It's really an assessment for the United States and Israel to make as the parties directly part of that conflict. Certainly, it has had unanticipated consequences for other partners like Australia. The elevated oil prices that have flown through to petrol and diesel prices have hurt Australians and the Australian economy, and other US allies around the world. I think it has disrupted the region. Other Gulf partners of the United States have certainly been direct targets of Iran in a way they never have been before. But if it ends with the Iranian nuclear ambitions effectively put on ice, and if it ends with Iran's regional ambitions restrained and with the Strait reopened, then I think there has been some progress made.
CLENNELL: Sounds like you think it's doubtful whether it was worth it.
PATERSON: I'm trying to be deliberately measured in my assessment because I think it's too early to say honestly, Andrew. It will depend on the exact terms of the deal and what happens next. I mean, we strongly supported rhetorically and morally the US strikes on Iran because we remember that the Iranian regime is responsible for domestic terror acts on our soil, on Australian soil, because we know Iran has destabilised the Middle East and the world, because we know they're the largest state sponsor of terror. So it's had a strong moral justification from the very start. The strategic implications of it, though, will take some time to be clear.
CLENNELL: I wanted to ask now about the retirement of your colleague Jonathan Duniam, announced yesterday. It's a blow for the Liberal Party, isn't it?
PATERSON: Yeah, there's no sugarcoating it. Jonno is a really good mate of mine, and so I'm sorry personally that he'll no longer be a colleague in the parliament, but he's also just a highly accomplished, highly capable political professional. There is no one who understands the functioning of the Senate better than Jonno, and he's been a safe pair of hands in every single portfolio that he's held. So he is a loss to the Coalition. There's no point in pretending otherwise, but I do respect and understand his reasons. His wife, Anisa, and his three boys have supported him, not just for the last decade in the Senate, but for about 15 years before that as a staffer as well. So it's 25 years of service to the Liberal Party in politics, and that does take its toll.
CLENNELL: What did you make of the comments he made about the leadership change taking it out of him and sort of being the start of that decision? Do you think that was a reference to his mate Andrew Hastie missing out on the top job?
PATERSON: No, it wasn't specifically a reference to that. And Jonno and I have talked about this over a long period of time. Leadership changes are just bruising exercises. They might be fun for journalists to cover but I tell you they're not fun for politicians to participate in and that and a range of other challenges as Jonno listed including dealing with the prohibited hate organisations legislation and other contentious debates have been really draining on him. And for someone who's given so much to the party and to public life over such a long period of time he's decided that now is enough and it's time to put his family first and I understand why he wants to do that.
CLENNELL: I played some of Tony Burke's comments from Sunday Agenda on migration. Do you buy his argument that the government can keep net migration down to 220,000?
PATERSON: Well, they've failed to every single year they've been in office where they've set targets of around that, and they have been way, way, way above it. In some years in their early years in office half a million people came to our country in NOM terms. And even in more recent years where they have got closer to their target, they are still tens, if not hundreds of thousands out from reaching it. And it has had an enormous impact on our housing market. When you bring in roughly 1.4 million people over four years, when you build only about half a million homes in a country that already had a housing deficit, it's no wonder rents are up, and housing has become less affordable, and I really doubt about this government's resolve.
CLENNELL: Yeah sure, but he claimed the 500,000 was under your settings, that's the line he kept pushing out yesterday, what do you say to that?
PATERSON: Well, a couple of things. First of all, the government is responsible for what happens on their watch, and they are able to change the settings at any time, and they're responsible for every single person that came into this country on their watch. But also, Andrew, I am old enough to remember when Clare O'Neil was the Home Affairs Minister, and she was boasting about hiring extra people in the Department of Home Affairs to process visas, to deal with the so-called Coalition backlog of visas. Well, guess what the effect of hiring extra public servants to process visas faster was? More people coming into our country, record numbers. So they own this, they're responsible for this, as they are responsible for their ongoing failure to bring the numbers back down to more sustainable levels.
CLENNELL: He seemed to be leaning into the opposition's policy to tie housing starts with migration while arguing you hadn't always passed the legislation such as around student housing and working holidaymakers yet to be a decision on that that would assist that. What do you make of that?
PATERSON: Well, I think the Coalition's commitment in Angus Taylor's budget reply to link migration numbers going forward to housing is just self-evidently a sensible thing to do. You cannot bring in more people than you can house. And Labor's failure over the last four years to adequately build enough homes and to bring in too many people has made it much harder for Australians to get into the housing market to afford their rent. And so we want to bring those things back into balance. We're not anti-migration full stop. There is a role for migration. It just has to be sustainable. And we think that's a self-evidently sensible thing to do.
CLENNELL: Well, he also sort of admitted there was a deliberate slowdown of processing of spouse visas, which, it's been put to me, could actually be in breach of the Migration Act. What do you think of that?
PATERSON: Look, I don't want to give legal advice on that on your program this afternoon without having properly considered it. I'm sure the government wouldn't be doing something that is knowingly unlawful. And I think it is appropriate for the government to pace the processing of visas to ensure that it is sustainable. If though, the government needs to make legislative change to make sure that they are on strong legal footing, I am confident that the opposition would provide bipartisan support to make we can get these numbers under control. Frankly, we want these numbers to be brought under control sooner rather than later. We don't want to have to wait to win the next election to bring those numbers under control. There are things that can be done now to make it more sustainable. We will support them to do so.
CLENNELL: What do you expect from Pauline Hanson's address at the National Press Club tomorrow?
PATERSON: Good question, Andrew. I don't know exactly what she has in store for us, but I think as someone who is now doing very well in the polls, who has spoken openly about her ambition to serve as Prime Minister and to form a One Nation Government after the next election, I think there are some obligations that come with that. She should be able to set out who her Cabinet would be, who the people would be that would fill at least the major positions in her Cabinet. Who would her Treasurer be? Who would her Foreign Minister be? Who would her Defence Minister be? Who would her Finance Minister be, who would her Health and Education Ministers be? Because Australians walking into a polling booth at the next election deserve to know. Pauline can't run the country all on her own, who would her team be? I think they also have to set out more clearly their policies and how they would actually work. It's very easy to have thought bubble ideas, but you actually need to get your policies costed and they have to be open to public scrutiny. Pauline Hanson has previously said that it's not available, an option to her, to have her policies costed. I think she told you that on your program, but that's just not true. Every parliamentarian can have their policies costed, and so there are no excuses for One Nation not doing so.
CLENNELL: One Nation's obviously gaining a lot of their support from their strong anti-immigration stance. Do you think the Socceroos' performance might change some views in this country on migration, given the performance of players like Nestory Irankunda?
PATERSON: I think it's a great thing about Australia that there are people who have come to our country, who have committed to our country, who want to put on the national uniform and represent our country abroad, and we are a country from a multitude of places around the world. The key thing is not your ethnicity or your nationality, or certainly the colour of your skin, or your religion, but your values. If you're committed to this country, if you've signed up to our values, I think you're very welcome here, and we're proud to have you represent us.
CLENNELL: When you advocated for a change to Angus Taylor, you said the Liberal Party was so far behind in the polls it had to change or die. Has it changed enough, or is it dying, the Liberal party?
PATERSON: Candidly, I think we've got more change that we've got to do. In fact, what we really have to do is demonstrate to the Australian people who are angry, who are crying out for change, that the Liberal Party and our National Party partners are the vehicles for change. We are the vehicle that can deliver the change that they want. A lot of parties are going to promise change, but I really doubt their ability to deliver it. We have to demonstrate that we are, and there are a lot of things we need to do to do that. One is that we need to continue to roll out our ambitious policy agenda. That started in the Budget Reply with things like the tax back guarantee, linking welfare and migration to be more in Australia's national interest and the housing changes. But we're going to have to have a lot more to say between now and the next election to just demonstrate that positive agenda - that if you vote Liberal and National at the next election you will get the change that you want to see in our country.
CLENNELL: Just finally, you're off to Japan this week, tell us about that trip.
PATERSON: Well, Japan is an absolutely critical defence and national security partner for Australia. It's hard to think of any other country in the Indo-Pacific that has more strongly shared values or more strongly shared interests. They have been chosen to help produce the general purpose frigate, the Mogami-class frigate, which I'll be talking to them about and meeting with parliamentarians, think tanks, and defence industry. But I'm also keen to discuss further areas for intelligence cooperation with Japan because really we do have shared challenges and a shared desire to see a free and open Indo-Pacific.
CLENNELL: James Paterson, thanks so much for your time.
PATERSON: Thanks, Andrew.
ENDS